Religion and violence were linked in several prominent incidents in 1993, including a shoot-out in Texas, a bombing in New York City, and rioting in India. But in the midst of conflict, interfaith understanding made progress, too. Homosexuality, the role of women, financial problems, and church-state relations provided challenges for religious groups during the year. (For figures on adherents of all religions by continent, see below.)

The fiery demise of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, that claimed the lives of David Koresh and at least 74 of his followers--preceded by a shoot-out in which four federal agents were killed--focused attention on how to define and deal with cults. The Seventh-day Adventist Church took pains to disassociate itself from the Koresh group, noting that the latter began as a sect in 1959 when it left a group that had itself earlier broken away from the Adventists. (See Seventh-day Adventist Church, below.) A statement issued after the Waco events by 16 religious and civil liberties groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Council of Churches, said, "Under the religious liberty provisions of the First Amendment, government has no business declaring what is orthodox or heretical, or what is a true or false religion."

Islamic fundamentalism came into the limelight again when followers of Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman were indicted on conspiracy charges in the February bombing of the World Trade Center in New York, in which six people were killed and 1,000 injured. Abdel-Rahman’s insistence on the use of the Qurˋan to govern Islamic societies and his advocacy of violence to overthrow Muslim leaders who disagree were criticized by a number of mainstream Islamic scholars, and several major mosques had refused to grant him a forum even before the bombing. (SeeWORLD AFFAIRS: Middle Eastern Affairs: Special Report.)

Members of an extremist Hindu movement called the Shiv Sena attacked Muslim neighbourhoods in Bombay and touched off riots that left hundreds dead in January. In August a bomb destroyed the Madras office of another militant Hindu group, killing at least 10 people and injuring 4. Indian Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao was widely criticized for failing to take strong action against Hindus following the violence in Bombay. (See Hinduism, below.)

Some of India’s interfaith conflicts made their way to the Parliament of the World’s Religions, a nine-day gathering held in Chicago that drew representatives of Bahaˋi, Buddhist, Christian, Confucian, Hindu, Jain, Jewish, Muslim, Native American, Shinto, Sikh, Taoist, Unitarian, and Zoroastrian groups. At an early session, a Sikh from Punjab denounced Hindus for persecuting his faith, touching off a shouting match that ended only when police arrived. Some Zen Buddhists objected to prayers offered to God, saying that they "can practice religion with or without God." Orthodox Christians walked out to protest the involvement of neopagans and other groups that "profess no belief in God or a supreme being." Four Jewish organizations withdrew as sponsors to protest an appearance by Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan, whom they accused of having promoted religious intolerance.

Despite these problems, the parliament ended with an address in which the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan Buddhist leader, stressed the common teachings--compassion, forgiveness, and love--of the major faiths and with the signing of a "Global Ethic" statement that condemned environmental destruction, hunger, poverty, sexual discrimination, and violence, especially "aggression and hatred in the name of religion."

Catholic-Jewish relations got a boost when one of Israel’s two chief rabbis, Israel Meir Lau, spiritual leader of Israel’s Jews of European descent, met with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican in September and when the Vatican recognized the state of Israel in December. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America asked its ecumenical affairs department to prepare a statement addressed to the Jewish community repudiating "the anti-Judaic rhetoric and violent recommendations" of Martin Luther.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) voted to endorse the Consultation on Church Union (COCU) plan for mutual recognition of ministers and joint celebration of communion, becoming the third of its nine member denominations and the first large mainline body to take the step. In St. Louis, Mo., in July, two other COCU members, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and the United Church of Christ, held joint national meetings for the first time. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to work toward a 1997 deadline for achieving full communion with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Reformed Church in America, and United Church of Christ.

An ecumenical celebration of the 400th anniversary of the (Lutheran) Church of Sweden drew the participation of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople; Edward Cardinal Cassidy, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity; and Bishop John Hind of the Church of England. A conference in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, sponsored by the Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches (WCC) drew 400 participants. WCC General Secretary Konrad Raiser called for "a new ecumenical reality" that would go beyond official theological dialogues. Greek Orthodox Archbishop Stylianos of Australia, who chaired the Orthodox delegation to the meeting, said the Orthodox participants were "deeply offended" by some comments made at the gathering, apparently referring to remarks in favour of ordination of women and shared communion.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) approved a three-year churchwide study on whether to ordain practicing homosexuals while retaining its ban on allowing them to serve as clergy, elders, and deacons. The action at the church’s General Assembly in Orlando, Fla., touched off a demonstration by more than 60 people, including the Rev. Jane Spahr, a lesbian whose clergy appointment by a congregation in Rochester, N.Y., was overturned by the denomination’s highest court in 1992. Leaders of the National Council of Churches (NCC) made plans for a discussion involving representatives of its 32 member churches and of homosexual groups, including the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, which had tried unsuccessfully for more than a decade to gain membership or observer status in the NCC. Mel White, an evangelical writer who ghostwrote books for the Rev. Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, announced his homosexuality when he was installed as dean of the 1,200-member Cathedral of Hope in Dallas, Texas, which describes itself as the world’s largest gay and lesbian congregation. (SeeSpecial Report.)

The Anglican dioceses of Vermont and Toronto elected women bishops in 1993; only one woman had previously been elected to such a position in the worldwide Anglican Communion. The Mennonite Church chose Donella M. Clements as its moderator, making her the first woman to hold its top position. The Christian Reformed Church (CRC), which had debated ordination of women for several years, voted at its synod to allow local congregations to decide the matter for themselves. Although another synod would have to ratify the resolution before it could be implemented, the action touched off immediate protests by conservatives, including a group of Korean-American church leaders who formed a breakaway body that included more than a third of the CRC’s 47 Korean-language congregations. A week before the CRC synod met, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America, a smaller, evangelical church body, urged the CRC to repent over its "departure from the Scriptures in its doctrine and practice." The Church of England’s 1992 decision to open the priesthood to women led some opponents, including the retired bishop of London, to join the Roman Catholic Church.

A growing number of cases involving sexual misconduct of Catholic clergy prompted Pope John Paul II to set up a panel of Vatican and U.S. Catholic Church experts to determine how best to handle such matters under church law, while the U.S. bishops established their own eight-member committee on the matter. The pope won cheers from 186,000 youths who attended a week-long international gathering in Denver, Colo., but surveys found that many Catholic teens took issue with the church’s teachings on abortion, birth control, and homosexuality. In an encyclical titled Veritatis splendor, Latin for "The Splendour of Truth," John Paul said opposition to church teaching "cannot be seen as a legitimate expression of Christian liberty" and urged that clergy who violated official doctrines be removed from their positions. (See Roman Catholic Church, below.)

In November the Rev. Gordon L. Summers of the Moravian Church was sworn in as president of the NCC. Financial problems prompted several denominations, including the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), and Southern Baptist Convention, to make more budget cutbacks. However, the WCC ended up in the black for the second year in a row, and three former U.S. presidents, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan, agreed to serve as honorary cochairmen of a drive to raise $10 million for the faith and order work of the National and World Councils of Churches.

U.S. Pres. Bill Clinton drew criticism from his own denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, which opposed his policies on abortion and homosexual rights and urged him to "affirm biblical morality in exercising his public office." Earlier Clinton had invited leaders from 15 denominations in the NCC to meet with him in the White House, signaling a greater openness to mainline denominations than had been the case in the Reagan and Bush administrations. Leaders of the NCC, the U.S. Catholic Conference, and the Synagogue Council of America met in Washington, D.C., in June and issued a 4,000-word statement seeking to initiate "a fresh debate over the renewal of the general welfare" in the United States. The statement said the welfare of the weakest members of society was "a crucial moral test" of the common good. (SeeSpecial Report.) Most religious leaders and associations applauded Clinton’s signing on November 16 of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which reinstated significant restrictions on the government’s ability to regulate religious practices.

In a unanimous ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of the Santeria religious group to sacrifice animals during worship services, saying that no religion or religious practice may be "singled out for discriminatory treatment" even if its activities were viewed as "abhorrent" by most people. In an Arizona case, the high court ruled 5-4 that government-funded sign language interpreters may be provided for deaf parochial school students because such aid benefits the child and not the school. A unanimous decision in a New York case said religious groups must be allowed to use public schools after hours if such access was accorded to other community groups.

Massachusetts’ highest court overturned the 1990 manslaughter convictions of a Christian Science couple whose son died after they relied on spiritual rather than medical healing. The 6-1 ruling said David and Ginger Twitchell had "reasonably believed" they could rely solely on spiritual treatment without fear of prosecution. But a Minneapolis, Minn., jury returned a $5.2 million verdict against a woman who relied solely on spiritual healing while her 11-year-old son was dying from diabetes and against six other defendants, including a Christian Science congregation. The verdict was the first time that civil damages had been assessed against the church in connection with its teachings on spiritual healing.

In a widely discussed book titled The Culture of Disbelief, Yale law professor Stephen L. Carter said religion "often thumbs its nose at what the rest of the society believes is right" and that such dissent is necessary to preserve a healthy democracy. Carter said that "a religion is, at its heart, a way of denying the authority of the rest of the world." Darrell J. Turner

PROTESTANT CHURCHES

Anglican Communion

One hundred top Anglican leaders met in Cape Town, South Africa, in January 1993 to wrestle with a daunting list of issues, including threats to the communion’s unity posed by the 13 provinces that had ordained women. The archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. George Carey, presided at the meetings, while the archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Rev. Desmond M. Tutu, acted as host to this first-ever joint meeting between the communion’s primates and the Anglican Consultative Council, which represented churches in 163 countries. The international gathering followed a November 1992 meeting of Southern Africa’s Anglican bishops, who condemned South African political leaders over "growing and shocking tolerance of corruption, lies, and murder in political life." Criticizing both the South African government and the African National Congress, the bishops decried the "moral deterioration in South African society." Meanwhile, the sixth assembly of the All-Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) conferred the first AACC peace award upon two Mozambican churchmen, Anglican Bishop Dinis Sengulane of the Lebombo diocese and Roman Catholic Archbishop Jaime Gonçalves, in recognition of their contribution to the peace process in Mozambique.

The Church of England continued to grapple with the aftermath of its November 1992 decision to ordain women. Parliament approved the decision in November 1993. England’s Roman Catholic bishops promised a "generous and understanding" welcome to Church of England members who could not accept the decision and chose to leave. Among the first to do so was Graham Leonard, the retired bishop of London, a longtime opponent of women’s ordination. Carey told an ecumenical gathering in Belgium that "hopes for organic unity seem to have faded" between Anglicans and Roman Catholics.

U.S. Episcopalians were surprised by a membership gain for the second straight year, reversing a steady decline that began in 1966. In June the diocese of Vermont elected the Rev. Mary Adelia McLeod as its bishop, the first woman bishop to lead a U.S. diocese and only the second woman Anglican bishop worldwide. In November the Anglican Church of Canada elected Victoria Matthews of Toronto as its first woman bishop.

A conference in August on "Shaping Our Future: A Grassroots Forum on Episcopal Structures" attracted more than 1,000 participants from 96 dioceses. Participants ranging from traditionalists to liberal activists gathered in St. Louis, Mo., to discuss changes in the church’s structure and organization in order to focus more effectively on its mission.

Baptist Churches

The largest black Baptist religious group in the nation and probably in the world, the National Baptist Convention, USA, met in New York City’s Madison Square Garden, beginning Sept. 8, 1993, for its 113th annual gathering. First organized in 1880, the National Baptist Convention had more than 33,000 churches and was the third-largest Protestant denomination in the U.S. Discussions at the New York convocation showed that the organization was moving away from its conservatism of a few years earlier--when the leadership opposed, for instance, the methods of Martin Luther King, Jr.--toward more progressive positions such as voicing opposition to the Gulf war. The organization was now focusing more attention on issues such as "economic empowerment" of blacks, ways congregations can deal with AIDS, and strategies for halting the waste of young black lives through crime, poverty, and lack of opportunity.

National Baptist Convention president Theodore J. Jemison was again the subject of controversy. Some members questioned the wisdom of building a $12 million headquarters in Nashville, Tenn.; the organization had $4 million of the debt still outstanding. In 1992 Jemison had been charged with perjury in the rape trial of boxer Mike Tyson.

Among white Baptists, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, an organization of moderates, reacted to the tensions and battles resulting from a fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention and met to draw up and adopt a new constitution. Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter endorsed and pledged financial support for the group, and he gave the keynote address at the meeting. Carter, a lifelong Southern Baptist and deacon in his home church in Plains, Ga., said he valued his Southern Baptist heritage but regretted the denomination’s bitter internal politics during the past 14 years.

The Baptist World Alliance reported that the number of Baptists was growing in the Middle East, where Bible distribution was seen as a major evangelism tool. Continuing persecution of evangelicals was, however, still being reported in the region.

Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)

The Rev. Richard L. Hamm, 45, a Nashville, Tenn., church official, was elected in July 1993 as the Christian Church’s youngest-ever chief executive. He assumed a six-year term as general minister and president of the Indianapolis, Ind.-based denomination. His election was a highlight of the first Common Gathering of the Disciples General Assembly and the General Synod of the United Church of Christ in July. The mainline churches had enjoyed a unique "ecumenical partnership" since 1985.

The climax of the historic event in St. Louis, Mo., was an address, broadcast live across the United States, by the Anglican archbishop of Cape Town, Desmond M. Tutu.

The assembly took note of the disastrous flooding in the U.S. Midwest and voted $30,407 to support local relief efforts. In all, the Disciples of Christ contributed more than $575,500 toward flood relief.

Earlier in the year, general minister and president C. William Nichols called for U.S. Pres. Bill Clinton to lift the ban on gays in the military, while the assembly came out in favour of civil rights for gays and lesbians, supported the establishment of a national health plan in the U.S., and called for peace and an end to ethnic cleansing in the Balkans. In other church-wide activities, the Rev. Patricia Tucker Spier, a Tipton, Ind., pastor and former missionary to Japan, was elected president of the Division of Overseas Ministries.

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